In All the Empty Places
by Meredith Bronwen Mallory
Summary: A late night conversation in the Swamp.


As always, thank you for stopping in to read my humble fic! I hope it's worth your time. ^_^ 

Originally, this was part of the start of a larger chapter story. The idea was about as good as the food from the mess tent ^_~, but this scene is something I do like. ^_^ This could take place in any of the later seasons. I do hope you like it-- any comments would cause me to jump up and down and adore you.

And now, without further ado

"May God stand between you and harm, in all the empty places where you must walk."

-"An Old Egyptian Blessing"

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In All The Empty Places 1/1

by Meredith Bronwen Mallory

mallorys-girl@cinci.rr.com

http://www.demando.net/

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Evenings in the Swamp had their own rhythm, a proper sort of dis-order. Drinks from the Officer's Club inside their skin and drinks from the still in their hands-- Hawkeye and BJ, or, as the names seemed to *want* to be said; Hawkeye-and-BJ. One long word, one unit; that too, was the way of things. First they laughed, childish, off-color and off-key, over things they never would have found funny back Home. They were castoffs, home was a far away dream neither of them quite believed in anymore. The letters they received might well have come from no where-- there was nothing outside Korea for them, not now. The laughter would die, they would suck it back in with their gasping breaths, and then, when they were drunk enough and Charles was in post-op, they could be honest.

They kept the lights off-- the glow from the lantern outside the tent sketched everything in unskilled charcoal shadows. The light came through the netting, through the gin and through the cheap plastic martini glasses-- it's shimmering reflection alighted on the floor unless blocked. Hawkeye was holding the glimmer in his cupped hands, moving his fingers, distracted. 

"Is home real, Beej?" he didn't look up, just watched the little patch of illumination and remembered the smell of smoke on the forth of July, and a little boy asking his mother (who had been dead so long she was a fey flutter in the back of his mind) if she would help him catch one of the falling sparkles to keep in a jar. "'Cause," he went on, before the other man could speak, "I mean, sometimes I don't know. It's like when I was a kid and I used to go to the movies on Saturday afternoons, and when I came out it was all so bright and unreal. I had a real movie fetish, trust me, I know." Drunk, Hawkeye sounded much like that little boy-- BJ often thought he could see the other man's shadow shift. A sweet little boy, a good kid; this five year old devilish angel, sitting drunk in Korea. Boy, did his draft board ever go crazy.

"Oh, it's real... I hope," BJ's mouth felt thick under his mustache, and he giggled to himself a little. The absurd, fuzzy handle-bar was like a disguise-- Peg would never recognize him-- and his laughter faded. "I mean, sometimes I wake up and I think if I just roll over Peg'll be there and..."

"S'not enough room to roll over in an army cot," Hawkeye said wisely, "I tried."

"No," the other doctor murmured, "No, there isn't." He reached out, suddenly, over the still, his wide hands driving into a stack of his bunk-mate's things. "See, home is real," he held up a letter triumphantly, "Letter from your Dad, right? 'Dear Ben...'" he began to read, but faltered and frowned with the alien title. "That's strange."

"What is?" Hawkeye had abandoned his little shaft of light-- it lay tossed aside on the dirt floor like a puddle needing a mop. "Wait-- I know my dad. Bet you anything that if you read every other word, it's a plan for our escape."

Something stirred in BJ's ribs-- between them, really-- momentarily distracting him. "Our?" he repeated.

"Sure," Hawkeye laid back on his cot, arm thrust over his eyes. He was wide awake, pretending to be asleep. "You and me. I won't leave you here. Not like.... Trapper. No sir, Beej, I'm taking you with me. Korea doesn't deserve you."

"Huh," another stir, strong and making him shiver. To combat it, BJ fumbled for his lost line of thought, "Funny, your Dad calling you Ben."

"It's my name," without looking, BJ knew Hawkeye was shrugging. There was a brief sound-- with your eyes closed, you could pretend it was birds, or your wife turning in bed next to you-- cloth moving, footsteps. Hawkeye's long fingers touched the letter, took it gently from his friend's hand and set it aside. Looking up, BJ saw the glint of tarnished summer blue in Hawkeye's gaze. 

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(There was a nursery rhyme, Peg sang it to Erin-- What was it? "My sweet baby blue, I'll always be true...")

For a moment, they stayed just like that, BJ looking up and Hawkeye looking down, waiting. Finally, the younger man folded his long limbs to side on the floor beside BJ's cot. Warmth, liquid-- BJ could feel it right behind his heart. 

"What's so funny about calling me 'Ben'?"

"You're not Ben to me," BJ said, and his hand found Hawkeye's shoulder, rested (possessively -- mine -- tenderly) there. "It doesn't even sound like you."

"Ben is the person I left at home," Hawkeye said, his tone wondering. He had only just discovered that himself. "Maybe Ben is dead. My father... maybe I lied when I said the army made a mistake. Maybe Ben really is dead."

"Doesn't matter to me," BJ said with a strange fierceness, "You're Hawkeye. Ben doesn't mean anything to me." 

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(you don't have to pretend this war hasn't touched you, not with me. you don't have to try to really smile when you've forgotten how. i know you, the person you are now)

Almost languidly, Hawkeye leaned into BJ's hand, captured it between his shoulder and his chin. He wasn't thinking, neither of them were.

"What does BJ stand for?" Muffled. Slowly, Peg's husband (yes, remember that) laid down with his head at the foot of his cot and his friend still holding his hand.

"I don't remember."

A drunken snort from Hawkeye.

"No, honest, I can't... I'm not that person I was before, either."

Hawkeye's breathing was deep and even, "You're BJ."

A breath out, "Yes."

This was too much! Here they were, like children awakened and bewildered from a nightmare-- still adrift in their own, strange little world. Adrift *together*. He reached for something from home, something that smelled and felt of Mill Valley.

"When Peg was little, she had another name, too," BJ swallowed.

"Oh?"

"She lived next door to me, growing up."

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(she has always been there. the sun rises, the cherry tree on the corner blossoms, and peg is peg, in the house next door, in the window opposite mine, with the little unicorn-shaped glass to catch the sun)

Vaguely, Hawkeye said, "Huh."

"We played together all the time, even though..." BJ made himself laugh, for the memory of fumbling in the dark, of feeling her curves with his hand and feeling almost *nothing* in his heart... Thrust, in out. You want a baby, don't you? Well. "Even though I thought she had cooties. When we played, I used to call her Anne-Helene."

"A lot harder to say than 'Peg'," Hawkeye shifted.

"'Hawkeye' is a longer word than 'Ben'."

"True."

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((It's their wedding night, and her white ivory gown is falling away like water. He holds her, tries to learn her body with his hands, but they are going no-place. She bites her lips and tries, tries hard. They're friends and they love each other as well as they know what love is. 

Someone suggests turning off the lights. In the hotel bed, under the whimsical painting of the clown, Peg lays still and limp, with the light coming under the bathroom door and BJ on top of her. 

"I'm sorry, I'm sorry." He can't stop saying it. They are both virgins. 

It's like she's dead under him, there is no magic in this. He tries hard to find that beautiful lady he holds close to his heart-- she is beautiful to him, as light through a tulip petal or a rainbow, purely artistic. "Anne-Helene," he says, remembering games of knight-and-damsel-in-distress, "Anne-Helene, Peg, I love you. Anne-Helene."

She cries, says his full name, says, "I love you too." But it doesn't really work.

After that, he never calls her "Anne-Helene" again. ))

"You know what I'm most afraid of?" Hawkeye asked. He shifted again, but his robe did not move with him. BJ's hand rested against the now bare skin, feeling warmth and the faint reverb of Hawkeye's pulse. Briefly, BJ started to remove his hand, but could not deny his friend that comfort. 

"What?" he asked into the dark. 

"I'm afraid that when I get home, my Dad won't recognize me," Hawkeye hissed, voice raw and ringing of gin. "Or I won't recognize him. I don't know which would be worse."

"I know the feeling," BJ nodded, pausing a moment before taking his hand away. A stalky Charles-shaped shadow was moving across the compound, and they were both properly in their own beds as if trying not to get caught at something. 

'We haven't done anything', BJ thought, and to cement that, he said, "I really miss Peg." 

Then he wished Hawkeye good night, and turned away.

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[to the tune of "God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen"]

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Go on your way my little fic,

I hope that people read,

and the little authoress, they remember to feed.

Yes any comments readers have-- I would so adore,

Because I really hope my fic was not at all a bore.


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